Army Starts New Psychiatric Program

By ROBERT WELLER

The Associated Press Friday, August 10, 2007; 11:18 PM

DENVER -- The Army has launched a nationwide program to teach soldiers and their families how to identify signs of possible psychiatric injuries suffered in the war on terrorism that may have gone unnoticed.

The Army is responding to widespread reports that soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with mild brain damage and post-traumatic stress disorder were treated as malingerers or unfairly dismissed from the service. _____________________________________________________________________ A war like none other; under-funded, under-manned and now under-supported.

Aside from those issues, this war has combined body-armor and roadside explosives to create a whole new category of trauma. Thousands, perhaps tens of thousands who would have been sent home in body-bags in previous wars, now come back to their country and their families without evident wounds, but increasingly disabling brain injuries.

As usual, the military is slow to acknowledge and quick to dismiss. Possibly that is changing, but the medical response to Cheney's 'quick war' is heartbreak and ignorance.

* For more in-depth articles from Jim on Iraq War, check out Opinion-Columns.com